Thursday, June 23, 2016

The Muslim World and the Challenge of Modernity

The issue of compatibility of
Islam and modern liberal democratic values keeps on creeping into the public
debate following each terrorist attack and each tragic development in the
Middle East, and there have been plenty of them over the last few years to
ensure that the debate never falls off radar. Indeed, ever since the breakout
of what has popularly been named the Arab Spring and the assortment of dramatic
developments affiliated with it—the implosion of Syria, Iraq and Yemen, the
rise of ISIS as a global terrorist threat, and the emergence of the global
refugee crisis—popular media, think tanks and an ever growing circuit, if not circus,
of pundits and experts have kept the debate going, often at the expense of its
quality.

Still, the question of the
seeming incompatibility of Islam and modernity, the conclusion that many people
seem to reach in this conversation, warrants attention.

Modern liberal democratic values
emerged gradually and piecemeal within the context of internal multifaceted
developments particular to the Western powers over a period of several
centuries. The last two of those centuries, in particular, have been critical.
Indeed, Western societies have had ample time to absorb the social and cultural
shocks involved in the transition, and while an element of shock therapy—often
unintended—was occasionally involved, Western social mores changed slowly and
gradually. To be sure, lingering rejectionism and atavistic longings in some
circles sometimes express themselves in violent forms, and they still come as
indications that the battle is far from being settled. Still, the West has made
big strides in embracing liberal values associated with modernity.

What helped facilitate this
development as well was the fact that the processes of modernism in the West
were driven purely by internal dynamics, which expressed themselves through
familiar languages and institutions. The role of external input into this
development was minimized centuries earlier. The West’s liberalization did not
take place as a result of contact or competition with other societies. For the
most part, Western societies dealt with modernization from s position of
strength and leadership, and modernity served to empower the West and reinforce
its feeling of superiority vis-à-vis other societies and cultures. As popular
awareness of this link grew stronger, through improved education and the
increasing role of mass media, so did the popular embrace of modern
values.

Embracing modern liberalism from
a position of political, cultural and economic weakness, on the other hand, is
hard. Some countries—Japan and South Korea, most notably—have done it
relatively successfully. But it’s a wrenching process under the best of
circumstances. In the case of Muslim-majority countries, the dynamics of
liberalization have been radically different from those in the West. Modern
values did not emerge as a result of organic internal processes, but as a
result of contact, often violent, with the West. It came as the product of
various acts of imposition inspired by or, on occasions, directly supported by,
Western powers. In a sense, rather than leading to an overall sense of popular
empowerment, modern values seem to come at the Muslim world’s expense,
especially in the political and economic realm. Moreover, the modern values
system came as a whole package deal, an already highly-elaborated system of
rules and norms. Concepts such as citizenship, parliaments, elections, women’s
rights, homosexual rights, and freedom of religion and speech were introduced
into Muslim societies simultaneously or within short intervals of one another,
giving people little time to absorb the shocks often involved.

Still, Muslim-majority societies
and countries have been dealing with the challenges posed by modern values for
more than a century now, and the increased levels of violence at this stage
indicate how threatened adherents of fundamentalism and traditionalism feel,
and how deep have been the inroads made by Muslims who have adopted the
modernization agenda. This progress has been achieved despite tremendous
setbacks, including the failure of liberalism and nationalism in the design of
key states, and the rise of mafia-like regimes which, despite speaking the
language of modernization at times, are more interested in transforming their
countries into private fiefdoms than in real modernization or secularization as
such.

Global geopolitical dynamics
leading to the two world wars, the Cold War, and the Global War on Terror have
involved repeated acts of direct and covert intervention in the region, and
they continue to impose on the region’s political, economic and intellectual
elite, greatly complicating the modernization project.

Another complicating factor
results from the intimate connection between modern values and Western culture.
Indeed, considering the geographic and cultural realities surrounding the birth
of modernity and liberalism, the process of modernization calls by its nature
for a great degree of Westernization as well—a fact that unsurprisingly fosters
certain feelings of resentment and inferiority among many Muslims, irrespective
of their educational backgrounds. Politically, this situation has contributed
to the unceremonious defeat of liberal forces at the hand of leftist and
Islamist counterparts, both of which reject in their different ways modern
liberal values.

Indeed, by embracing anti-Western
ideologies—despite the fact that this step itself is inspired by the writings
of Western authors—the Muslim Left, its secular trappings notwithstanding,
repudiated a core commitment to democracy and supported the establishment of
various autocratic regimes. These regimes were supposed to bring a measure of
social justice, but they broke the society instead, and they thus facilitated
the rise of Islamist movements in reaction. Even when the Muslim Left ended up
rediscovering the importance of democracy, it did so without appreciating the
necessity and usefulness of political engagement with Western governments; it’s
still a profoundly anti-Western movement. As a result, the Muslim Left remains
incapable of reaching compromises and working arrangements with Western
governments, and this weakens its position as an alternative both to existing
autocratic regimes and to Islamist movements alike. For a short while, the Arab
Spring phenomenon seemed about to alter these dynamics, but regional rivalries,
Russian influence, and the conflicting stances of the Obama administration
combined to strangle a more productive engagement in its crib.

And so, despite the fact that the
embrace of modern liberal values is the step that Muslim societies need to
undertake in order to empower their peoples and facilitate their own national
and regional development, the manner with which these values continue to be
introduced into play—that is, through the auspices of a privileged, Westernized
elite, and as a result of some pressure from Western governments—continues to
make this development a tall order for the foreseeable future.

This is a classic Catch-22
situation. Since we cannot completely divorce modernity from its Western
trappings, or seek its introduction to Muslim societies without the involvement
of Westernized elements, attempts at modernizing Muslim-majority countries
continue to fail. Yet the involvement of Western support and Westernized elites
continues to be the very recipe for that failure.

The solution? Keep trying and
experimenting with different approaches, even at the cost of repeated failure.

For, in reality, no failure is
complete. Much of the Muslim World has been modernized, and yes, that means
Westernized, over the course of the Twentieth Century. A process of
internalization of modern values has been underway since the beginning of contact
between the Muslims World and the modern West. And in some places, it has borne
fruit. Tunisia and Indonesia, for example, have made remarkable progress. It’s
easy to lose sight of that progress in the face of spectacular failures like
Egypt, Libya, and most appallingly, my native Syria. But that doesn’t make
those successes less real.

Considering the elements of
foreignness, alienation and resentment involved in change, it is bound to come
in fits and starts, and the overall process is bound to be violent and unequal,
affecting different Muslim societies at different rates and in different ways.
Some societies and states will not be able to cope, and will implode
spectacularly under mounting pressures and contradictions. In this
hyper-connected world, Muslims will not be the only ones affected by such
developments, so global and regional powers have to agree on ways to handle the
aftermath. The current inability on part of governments in powerful countries
around the world to recognize that certain “local” developments are bound to
have global consequences poses a serious security challenge to the current
order.

But the ultimate price for
delaying modernization in Muslim-majority countries will be borne mostly by
Muslims, and though there will always be blame to go around, the ultimate
responsibility for this state of affairs still falls on the shoulders of the
Muslim elites.

On the bright side, and for all
the violence that it has inadvertently unleashed, the phenomenon that came to
be known as the Arab Spring actually represents a major step in the
modernization processes of many Muslim-majority countries, and its effects are
bound to go global. Secularism, women’s rights, homosexual rights, atheism and
heresy have once again become part of an open public debate that is unlikely to
disappear anytime soon. Despite all of the difficulties and setbacks, it’s
clear now that there is a solid constituency out there that has embraced modern
values and others that have made tremendous strides in this regard. These
constituencies may not win the day at this stage, at least not in regard to all
of the issues involved, and many of their most vocal spokespeople might end up
in exile in countries, in prisons, or in refugee camps around the world. But,
in this day and age, distance hardly consigns the determined to irrelevance.
Change might be slow but it will not be stopped. The violent nature of the
current struggle should not blind us to the progress already made or to the
fact that we seem to be heading in the right direction despite all setbacks. In
due course, most Muslim-majority societies will come to terms with modernity to
the benefit of all. The people taking part in the current debate about Islam
should bear this in mind.

Go ahead, patronize me!

About Ammar

Ammar Abdulhamid is a Syrian-American author and pro-democracy activist based in Silver Spring, Maryland. He is the founder of the Tharwa Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to democracy promotion. His personal website and entries from his older blogs can be accessed here.

The Delirica

The Delirica is a companion blog to the Daily Digest of Global Delirium meant to highlight certain DDGD items by publishing them as separate posts. Also, the Delirica republishes articles by Ammar that appeared on other sites since 2016. Older articles can be found on Ammar's internet archive: Ammar.World